Women, Colonial Hybridity and Nationalism: An Examination of Identity Formation in Zanzibar and Réunion

This text provides the first comparative study of the role of Zanzibari and Réunionnais women in the history of nation building during the colonial and post-colonial eras, linking efforts to create nationalist identities with the evolution of cultures of hybridity in these islands. Hybridity or métissage are a key aspect of this dissertation because once they are acknowledged to exist in a given locale, they complicate the idea of nationalities as inherent through effectively revealing how identities are constructed. By examining the role of women through considering sex, virginity, marriage, religion, and politics, I reveal how the personal realm is connected to the political, specifically, how national identities in these two locales have stemmed from controlling women's sexuality and maternity.